


meet-cute

by astrolesbian



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Fake Marriage, Fake/Pretend Relationship, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-25
Updated: 2015-08-25
Packaged: 2018-04-17 06:23:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,436
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4655991
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/astrolesbian/pseuds/astrolesbian
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Hill says “You and Barnes are on this one together, Rogers,” and Natasha is smirking behind her like she knows something Steve doesn’t, and that’s where it starts.</p>
            </blockquote>





	meet-cute

**Author's Note:**

  * For [hedgewilde](https://archiveofourown.org/users/hedgewilde/gifts).



> this was a gift for the lovely becka <3 i hope u like it!!!

Hill says “You and Barnes are on this one together, Rogers,” and Natasha is smirking behind her like she knows something Steve doesn’t, and that’s where it starts.

 

“How does it feel to be part of a rom-com cliche, Rogers?” Natasha asks, smiling like a madwoman, like this whole thing is hilarious instead of mildly terrifying.

“Ha ha,” Steve says, in monotone, to show how funny he thinks it is. Natasha flops down onto her bed in the hotel room, like she’s a twelve-year-old and not a superspy. “Funny, Romanoff. You’d think this was all part of your master plan.”

“You say that like you genuinely think I _have_ a master plan,” Natasha says, and cracks open one of her eyes to look at him. “I’m actually very touched by that.”

Steve resists the urge to stick his tongue out at her. (Maybe _he's_ the twelve-year-old.)

He and Nat got the news about the mission together, the mission where he is apparently going to have to pretend to be his best friend’s husband, and she’s taking it a _bit_ too well. He shoots her a look, and she's pulled out her phone; he hopes she's not texting Sam—not that he doesn't want Sam to know, it's just that he doesn't need two people making fun of him right now, Natasha is more than enough.

His phone buzzes in his pocket, and he bites back a groan. She texted Sam.

“So what’s your backstory?” she asks, after it becomes clear he’s not going to answer his phone and talk to Sam about—whatever.

“My what?”

“Making a backstory for how you got together is the best part,” Natasha points out, sitting up and rifling through her bag for sweatpants. “Last time Clint and I were on a mission together, he used to own a zoo and tragically lost it in the economic collapse, then scraped together his last few pennies and came to Jersey, where he met me, a flower shop owner with a large inheritance from my dead uncle, who was a mafia boss. At first he wooed me for the money, but soon he fell desperately in love with me, even though I had an awful Jersey accent.”

“That’s really specific,” Steve says dubiously. “And weird.”

“We were bored on the plane,” Natasha shrugged. “Jersey to California is a long flight.”

“California?”

“I wanted to have our honeymoon in Hollywood,” Natasha says. “My name was Nellie, and she was a film nut.”

“Classy,” Steve says. 

Natasha grins smugly. “That part was Clint’s idea.” She starts French braiding her hair in easy movements. “Seriously, though, Steve, you have to give some thought to this. People are really invasive with the questions when you say you’re on a honeymoon, or an anniversary. They assume you’re a happy couple with a meet-cute, and you gotta give the people what they want, right?”

Steve rifles through his bag for a toothbrush. “Who says we’re gonna be on our honeymoon?”

Natasha gives him a look like she pities him. “You’re going to _Europe,_ Rogers. You’re on your honeymoon.”

 

“So,” Bucky says, staring at his hand, which currently contains two rings. “Kinda thought you’d be a little more romantic than this, Stevie.”

“Fuck off,” Steve says, cracking a grin for the first time all morning, but it doesn’t stop the pang of—longing, nervousness, _whatever_ —when Bucky laughs and slides the ring on, easy as anything, tossing the other to Steve, who catches it in one hand.

“Romanoff says we need a backstory,” he says, and chuckles again at the pained look on Steve’s face. “I’m thinkin’ you’re a tortured artist type, came to the big city thinkin’ you were gonna be the next Picasso but instead you just met me in a hipster record store—”

Steve shoves him. “I _still_ don’t get why we need a backstory,” he says. “People aren’t really gonna _ask_ us questions about the history of our _relationship_ —”

“You never know,” Bucky says, solemn as anything. “Rule number one is _be prepared,_ Stevie.”

 

“So how did you boys meet?” the stewardess says on the plane, her eyes kind and interested. Bucky gets the shit-eating grin that means he was right and Steve was wrong, and shoves him in the side. Steve shoves back.

“Well, ma’am,” Bucky says, “believe it or not, we just had the same morning class way back when.”

“Oh, you met in college,” she laughs. “That’s real cute. What class?”

“You know what,” Bucky says, and winks at Steve, the asshole, “I was so busy staring at him all the way through, I don’t even remember.”

Steve snorts, like he’s heard this story a million times before, and Bucky takes his hand and laces their fingers together. He’s wearing a synthetic skin over his arm for the mission, his hair pulled back, and Steve is sporting a pair of glasses that remind him of the ones he wore when he and Nat were on the run. They both look nothing like themselves, but Bucky still looks so good he makes Steve want to scream.

As much as he hates himself for thinking it, it was much easier to be kinda (completely) in love with his best friend when he thought said best friend was dead. (Not that he would trade this for anything, it’s just. He has to go back to hiding it now. And that’s more complicated, somehow, than it used to be. Maybe because he half doesn’t _want_ to hide it anymore.)

Next to him, Bucky grins and laughs with the flight attendant, and his thumb traces up and down Steve’s hand.

 

When they finally make it to the hotel room, Steve starts talking right away, scrubbing at his eyes as he starts to realize jet lag is hitting. “So we have to track them down as soon as possible, according to latest intel they’re planning something in two days, and Nat wants us to get them before then, if we don’t manage it then we’ll probably be here a week or more—”

“Relax, Steve,” Bucky says, flopping down onto the bed. “Aren’t we supposed to be on vacation?”

Steve glares at him half-heartedly, mostly to hide how he wants to laugh, and then freezes; sort of at the sight of Bucky on the bed, but mostly at the realization that there is only _one_ bed, as in, not plural. 

Bucky raises his eyebrows. “Enjoying the view, Rogers?”

Steve just raises his eyebrows back, looking from the bed to Bucky and back again, a sort of silent question that just makes Bucky snort.

“I won’t kick you so long as you don’t steal the blankets,” he says, and Steve laughs again, helplessly. “Cross my heart, Stevie.”

“I never steal the blankets,” Steve says, and adopts a fake-pious voice that always used to make Bucky howl. “I’ve never stolen a thing in my _life—”_

“Tell it to someone who cares, Rogers _,_ ” Bucky groans, and Steve grins and flops down next to him, and for a second, if he closes his eyes, it feels like the forties; his bed and Bucky’s shoved together so they could keep warm, Bucky always complaining Steve stole the goddamn blankets, _Jesus Christ, you want me to freeze or somethin’, Stevie?_

They’re quiet for a while, staring at the ceiling, until Bucky breaks the silence. 

“Bet you I can make someone cry with our meetcute story,” he says, and Steve snorts.

“Don’t we have to agree on a backstory, first?”

“That can be part of it,” Bucky suggests; he sounds like he’s been musing on it for hours. “The first fake story I tell which makes someone tear up is the one we keep for the rest of the trip.”

“You’re _on,_ ” Steve says.

 

“Okay,” Maria says, in his earpiece. “You’ve got civilians heading in. One of you needs to go out and distract them, we can’t afford anyone knowing about this.”

“Right,” Steve says, and then says, “Bucky, you can go—”

“Steve, you go and—”

They both break off, and stare at each other.

“I’m not leaving you to do this alone,” Bucky says, and his eyes are burning, just like they used to when Steve pulled a stupid stunt and ended up with a bloody nose and bruised knuckles. It kinda makes Steve want to kiss him—always did, if he’s being honest—but he didn’t have time to think about it then, and he doesn’t have the time now, either.

“I’m a hell of a lot more recognizable,” Steve points out. “It’s not many of them. I’ll be fine, Buck.”

“Just go, Barnes,” Maria says. “We can’t afford to wait.”

Bucky throws up his hands, straightens his clothes, and walks away, muttering into his mic. “Goddamn punk, pulling stunts like this,” and Steve rolls his eyes.

“You know I can _hear_ you,” he says, but Bucky doesn’t answer. 

A few seconds later, though, he hears the dregs of a conversation as he’s following behind a human-shaped shadow in the back alleys.

“Yeah, I dunno, I was looking for my husband but it’s all road work back there.”

A murmur, and the sharp breaths of the person Steve is tailing. 

“What, my husband? Yeah, just got married. Met him two years ago at a concert, the dumb punk fuckin’ smashed my head open because he knocked into me somehow, but he was cute as hell so I kinda let it go, you know?”

“That’s such a shitty meet-cute, Barnes,” Steve mutters, and he hears Bucky snort through the mic. Steve pauses, then adds, “I’m not gonna do anything dumb, all right? Not this time.”

“Christ,” Bucky mutters back. “Guess that’s all I can ask for.”

He sounds like he’s already running back to Steve’s side.

“You took all the dumb with you and put it into that story,” Steve says, instead of _thank you._

 

“You know,” Steve says, later, when they’re on their way back to the hotel, with _more_ information but not _enough._ “You’re gonna have to step up your game if you want to make someone cry.”

“A sentence I don’t think anyone ever thought Captain America would say.”

Steve rolls his eyes. “That joke was already old back when you first told it, _fifty years ago._ ”

Bucky shoves him. “Sam loves that joke.”

“Sam likes all kinds of stupid things.”

“Yeah, like _you—”_

“Shut up, Buck,” Steve says, but he knows he sounds too goddamn fond. “Let’s get some goddamn dinner, all right?”

 

“You guys are American,” the teenager at the checkout says, snapping her gum loudly. “You here on a honeymoon or a trip or somethin’?”

“Honeymoon,” Bucky says smoothly. 

“Ah, cool. How’d you guys meet?”

“He moved into the apartment next door from mine, and he always sang in the damn shower, so one day I sang along. He thought I was a ghost.”

“Almost sold my apartment,” Steve mutters, biting back amusement. “Didn’t, though. Lucky me.”

The teenager, formerly sullen, laughs. “That’s the funniest thing I’ve heard in a while,” she says, and gives them their change.

 

Bucky takes Steve’s hand on the way out, and doesn’t let go, all the way back to the hotel.

Steve thinks that it’s getting harder to pretend that this doesn’t mean anything, especially when Bucky drops his hand and yawns, tugging off his clothes and eating soggy french fries in just his sweatpants. “These _suck_ ,” he says. “Do they not know how to make good fries in Europe?”

Steve is staring, though, at the line of Bucky’s bare shoulders and the way his scars run over his skin, raised and pale. Not like he’s never seen it all before—not like he hasn’t seen _more_ —but it always aches, like he’s close to grabbing something he doesn’t know if he deserves.

Bucky catches him watching, and offers him a fry. Steve waves it off and lays down on the bed, looking at the ceiling to avoid looking back at Bucky’s bare torso.

The air feels stiff and hot, like it’s waiting; not like the past few nights when it’s just been comfortable, like always. 

“So,” Steve says, anything to break the silence. “Which one’s your favorite?”

“What d’you mean?” Bucky asks, shifting so he can look Steve in the eyes.

“Your stories,” Steve clarifies. “All those meet-cutes. You must have a favorite.”

Bucky doesn’t say anything for a while, long enough that Steve thinks he isn’t going to say anything at all.

Finally, though, he speaks.

“There’s one,” he says, “where I meet you when we’re kids—really stupid kids, you know, and we pull all kinds of shit together, and I fall hard on my ass for you when we were fourteen fuckin’ years old. And I never say shit about it because I might be a stupider kid than I thought I was.” He laughs. “And we move in together and it’s all pretty good even though we’re broke and I still never tell you, and I think it’s okay, whatever, you know?”

He goes quiet again.

“And then I lose you,” he says, after a second. “Or you lose me. Doesn’t matter. And a hell of a lot of time goes by, and we both kinda wander around looking for each other, in our own ways, and then you find me again, and I still don’t tell you.” His voice gets softer, a little more wistful. “Because really I’m too goddamn scared.”

Steve can feel his heartbeat in his throat, like he’s a scared kid, only this is more nervous and gut-twisting than scared. “Doesn’t sound like it ends too happy,” he says. “Why’s it your favorite?”

Bucky laughs, and it sounds sad but not choked off and bitter, not like so much of his laughter has been lately. “You know me, Stevie,” he says. “I’ve always been about the truth. Except when it mattered.”

Steve sits quiet for a moment, taking it in, hoping he’s not getting this wrong. If he is, he doesn’t think he can take it.

“Buck, you goddamn idiot,” he says, finally, and sits up, hand under Bucky’s chin, turning their faces together. He grins, wide and happy so Bucky can see it. “I’ve loved you since we were ten.”

“Holy shit, we really were stupid kids,” Bucky says, and then Steve is kissing him, and words don’t seem like they matter so much anymore.

 

 

On the plane ride back home, there’s a different stewardess, and she asks them the same question as the first one.

Steve squeezes Bucky’s hand and grins at her, and says, “It’s not really too interesting a story, ma’am.”

 

**Author's Note:**

> u also may recognize the various meetcute scenarios from the au masterposts that have been circling tumblr for months . . . i can't remember the individual posts but pls assume none of bucky's scenarios were ideas that came from me :^)
> 
> i am geniunely unsure if i like this fic or not....i think i've read it so many times that i'm fed up with it. but i really, really hope becka loves it and that others also enjoy it !!


End file.
